Building Consumer-based Brand Equity for Fast Fashion Apparel Brands in the Indian Consumer Market

Abstract

Brand equity is a key marketing concept for academia as well as practitioners due to its ability to provide competitive advantage to firms. In the recent past, fast fashion branding has drawn noticeable attention. Since brand equity elements can impact consumers’ perceptions as well as behaviours, firms in fast fashion market want to understand the role of these elements for designing and implementing sustainable brand strategy. By using Aaker’s brand equity model, research was conducted on a sample of population based in the national capital of India and north Indian cities. The survey confirmed that the creation of brand equity is dependent on four brand equity dimensions and that these dimensions are interdependent. The findings show significant, positive and direct impact of brand awareness on brand personality, brand personality on perceived quality and perceived quality on brand loyalty. In addition, brand awareness, brand personality, perceived quality and brand loyalty have significant, positive and direct impact on consumer-based brand equity (CBBE). The current study provides empirical evidence of impact of select brand equity dimensions on each other and all brand equity dimensions on brand equity. This study provides key insights for developing strategies to strengthen CBBE.